Perspective
by FPinFC
Summary: This is a very mellow story, because sometimes a cop's toughest battles are won over a cup of coffee. (To see where this story logically falls relative to the series and my other stories, please see my profile.)
1. Chapter 1 - Quiet Hopes

**Chapter 1**

**Quiet Hopes**

Ed Lane stretched his legs out in front of him with an almost-contented sigh.

_Almost_.

He could hold onto that pleasant feeling as long as he focused on the sweet sound of his wife's voice, alternating with his daughter's, as Izzie's bedtime routine unfolded. On this pleasant late-summer evening, with the windows open, their voices came through clearly to the balcony where Ed now reclined.

He swished his drink in lazy circles in his glass, ice softly clinking. A rum and coke, very light on the rum. He'd learned a lot from his best friend's long-ago fall.

_Sweet sounds indeed_. An innocent bedtime story. A lilting giggle. A three-year-old's joyful recitation of her favorite storybook phrases, triumphantly memorized.

Ed found himself anticipating each page, and how his daughter would respond to each picture, each line, each moment of connection forged with delight.

_Maybe I should go in there. It'd be nice... a few more minutes with my little girl..._

_But no. If I mess up the bedtime routine, she'll get fussy and want more. It will be my turn tomorrow night._

He sighed and tilted his head back to rest on the back of the deck chair. From this angle he could see a couple of lonely stars glittering, though the night had not yet fully fallen.

He stared, wondering for a moment at the vastness of it all, picturing the infinite array of stars he knew were up there, but which the lights of Toronto masked from his view.

_I wish I could see them._

_We need a vacation. Somewhere far, far from here. Somewhere that has never seen the things I've seen, the things this city has seen..._

He shoved that line of thought out of his head so violently that he bolted upright in his chair. A little of his drink sloshed onto his hand, and he bit back a curse.

_No, no. I'm okay. _

_Nothing is going to ruin this evening with Sophie._

Quieter, sleepier words now floated through the window, and Ed made himself focus on them until he could relax again. Until he could push away the horrors...

He swore softly again, and bent to rest his face in his hands, elbows on knees, mind in rebellion.

_Tragedies happen all the time. I can let go of the ones that didn't happen to me or my loved ones._

_Even if I saw them, in all their soul-ripping..._

_No. Not doing this. Not now. I'm okay. Sophie's okay. Clark's okay. Izzie's okay. The team is okay. Greg is okay...well, more okay than he was. _

_He'll never be okay._

_Stop it, Ed, just stop!_

He slugged down his drink in rapid gulps, guiltily wishing for a bit more rum to take the edge off.

The light in Izzie's window winked off, and Ed turned his focus to the balcony door. _At last. Here comes Sophie._

And soon, here she came, rewarding his wait with a soft smile. Instead of taking the chair beside his, she snuggled into his lap and rested her head on his shoulder.

He wrapped his arms around her and closed his eyes. She'd brought contentment with her, and he embraced it as a lifeline.

Neither of them spoke.

Ed felt himself slowly relaxing.

"Beautiful night," Sophie murmured.

"Yeah, I needed this."

She arched back a bit so she could look at his face, and her eyes searched his heart as only she could.

_No, baby, I don't want to talk about it. Please._

He saw her read him, saw her accept it. She snuggled back in, and he held her a little tighter. _Thank you so much, baby._ _You understood._

His cell phone rang, and he jumped.

"Oh no..." Sophie sounded more pleading than angry. She knew the ringtone as well as he did. Only calls from SRU headquarters, or from his teammates, sounded like that.

She sighed and stood so he could fish his phone out of his pocket.

He grimaced as he worked the phone out. "I'm sorry, babe."

"Maybe you're not being called in to work..."

"I hope not."

He furrowed his brow a bit as the large-font caller ID announced the name "Marty LeClerc." _I don't think he's ever called me after hours before._

He hit the "answer" button while giving Sophie another apologetic look.

Her expression told of good-natured resignation, rather than the resentment he probably deserved.

_You're a saint..._

"Hey, Marty, what's up?"

Sophie settled into the chair beside his, her eyes still glued on his face. She clearly knew that the fate of her evening would be decided in the next few minutes.

"Sarge? Hey...I'm sorry to bug you, sir..."

Ed sat up a little straighter. The rookie's voice sounded strained, almost desperate.

"No no no no, you're not bugging me, buddy, what's wrong?" He shot another look at Sophie. _This is worrying me_.

She sighed, but stayed engaged.

"I just...Sarge...maybe I shouldn't have called, but...I know that better cops than me have hit hard times and needed to talk to you, and..."

"Hey, it's no trouble, Marty. Seriously. We're a team, and we're here for each other. You know how I feel about that. Nobody on my team should come as close to imploding as I did. So I want you to call when you need to." He gave yet another glance at Sophie, and saw her close her eyes with a heavy sigh as her hopes died.

He reached to lay a hand on her arm. She put her hand on top of it.

Marty didn't speak for several beats. "I just...I don't know what's wrong with me..."

"You used lethal force for the first time just a week ago, buddy. It's not strange at all that it's hitting you now."

"No, it's not that...at least...I don't think it is..." Another silence. Ed could picture Marty's face as he worked through what was probably denial.

"What happened tonight, buddy?"

A long pause. "It's hard to talk about."

"I know it is, my friend. I know it's hard to talk about." This time his glance at Sophie carried a question. _Honey, do you mind? This could take a while._

She sighed and nodded. "Do what you need to do," she whispered.

_I love you! _ He mouthed to her, silently.

She only gave him an eloquent expression in return, one that said, _You're so lucky I love you too, because if I didn't..._

She kissed his forehead and started to head back into the house, but he grabbed her hand to keep her near.

"Marty, we need to talk face to face, I think. Where can we do that?" A new question darted from his eyes to hers now. Her eyes widened, and she jerked a thumb towards Izzie's room." _The baby's sleeping!_

"Look, Marty, I'll meet you somewhere, or you can even come here, as long as we keep it quiet enough not to wake the baby."

"Baby? I thought..."

"Okay, you're right. She's three. But compared to our grown son, she's still a baby to us. But anyway, we could talk here, or wherever, buddy. I just think that face-to-face is a lot better when you're hurting. And my friend, you're hurting. I hear it. So where are we meeting?"

"Um...someplace private...are you sure your house would be okay?"

"Yeah, I'm sure our house would be okay." He looked right at Sophie when he said that, and she shook her head...not with disagreement, but with disbelief. And yet, he still saw acceptance there.

"All right, you've got the address, right?"

Sophie gently drew her hand free and walked into the house as he spoke.

"Yeah...are you sure...?" Marty asked.

"I'm sure, so quit stalling, get in your car, and come over here, okay?" He put just a touch of authority into his tone to make it official.

"Okay, I'll be right over." The line closed.

Ed stood and walked into the house in pursuit of his wife. He found her in the bedroom, sitting on the bed, brushing her hair.

"Honey, I'm sorry...it's just that he sounds like he's in a bad way..."

"I know, I know."

"Maybe it won't take too long."

"We can hope."

"Yeah." He crawled across the bed to her side and sat cross-legged behind her. He took the brush from her hands and ran it through her hair, more as a conciliatory caress than anything. "I'm sorry," he whispered again.

"It's okay." She leaned back against him, and he wrapped his arms around her. "I figured out a long time ago that things go better at home when things go well with the team. So take care of Marty, and then come back here and turn off your phone, okay?"

"I promise!" He kissed the back of her head.

"Of course, if you two talk loudly enough to wake Izzie up, all bets are off."

"We'll be church mice."

"You'd better." She turned around for a quick kiss. "You're a good man, Ed Lane."

"I don't deserve you."

"True."

He couldn't resist a chuckle.

"Where does Marty live?"

"Only about three miles from here. It won't be long."

"Too bad."

He smiled again. "I'd better go wait for him in the living room."

"Okay."

Another quick kiss and Ed left her, softly closing the door behind him.


	2. Chapter 2 - Counsel

Chapter 2

Counsel

Ed stood by the front window and watched until he saw headlights pulling into his driveway. Then he opened the door so that Marty wouldn't have to knock or ring.

_Church mice._

"Hey," he said softly as soon as the rookie reached the top step.

"Hey, thanks again, man." Marty matched his quiet tone. His eyes darted to meet Ed's only briefly before turning away.

"Let's go in the den where we can talk uninterrupted," Ed replied, beckoning the rookie to follow him. "Can I get you some coffee?"

"Actually, that would be great. Thanks."

Ed showed Marty into the den and closed them in, taking care to make no noise with the door. Then he showed Marty to the single-cup coffee maker on the far wall, and the selection of coffees available. Soon the rookie's choice began brewing with a promising gurgle.

"Is that your daughter's room right across the hall?" Marty asked. Somehow, the way he said it, the question seemed sad.

"Yeah, but it's okay. She's not a terribly light sleeper. With the door closed, we can talk."

"Okay. Listen, I really appreciate this." As much as possible, he still seemed to be avoiding Ed's eyes.

"No problem." Ed handed him his coffee, and swept his arm wide to indicate the whole of his comfortably-furnished den. "Sit anywhere you like."

Marty picked a spot and sat down. He looked at the floor, and his hands fidgeted with his steaming cup.

"What's going on, buddy?"

"Your daughter's three?"

Ed nodded. "Yeah."

"Mine is almost three. Her birthday's next month. And my son is five. Just turned."

"Fun ages."

"Sometimes."

Ed grinned. "Yeah." He focused on Marty intently, reading body language and what little he could see in the profile of the downturned face.

Marty said nothing. His hands still fidgeted.

"Is this about your kids?" Ed prompted.

Unmistakable pain contorted Marty's face. He only nodded.

_He's almost in tears._ Ed leaned forward. "I know it's hard, buddy, but it gets easier once the first few words have come out. So just get the first few out, okay? It's all right."

"No, it's not all right!" Marty's words came out a bit more loudly than they should have, and he clearly knew it. He cast a guilty glance at the door and again fell silent.

"Your wife?"

"Renee's okay. She...she doesn't know..." He took a deep, shuddering breath. "She doesn't know how bad it is."

_Don't bet on it. _Despite his ever-growing concern, Ed allowed himself a sardonic smile. For a moment he flashed back to a particular jaw-dropping conversation with Sophie, in which she'd made him see that his whole soul had been an open book to her all along. _She may not have known the particulars, but she knew me. She knew me inside and out._

_And whatever she didn't know about, her guesses were scary-close._

"She doesn't know how bad _what_ is, Marty?" Ed's mind began racing ahead, bracing him against confessions of anything from time distortions to substance abuse to thoughts of suicide.

Marty sat in silence for another few moments, but his breathing grew more rapid. Ed could almost feel the words struggling to burst out of him.

The rookie finally looked up, his expression tortured. "Sarge, I love my kids, you've gotta believe that!"

"Of course I believe that, buddy!" Ed kept his face neutral, but his stomach knotted. _If he's abused one of his kids..._

_That would change everything. I would have legal obligations..._

Marty looked down again. "Have you ever...have you ever been so angry with your kids that...that you were tempted to...to hurt them?"

Ed's stomach tightened further. "Did you hurt one of your kids, Marty?"

"No!" LeClerc jumped and looked Ed full in the eyes. "No, I swear, I didn't!"

"I believe you, Marty, but you're going to have to help me out here. I know it's hard to talk about, but it's time to stop beating around the bush. What happened to upset you so much?"

"It's just...today was so rough, Sarge! Had you ever seen an accident like that before...you know...with a...decapitation?" He looked like even the word made him feel ill.

"Only once before. Horrible, horrible thing. I've been struggling with the images all night, Marty. I'm sure you have, too. But buddy..." he leaned forward and put a hand on the rookie's arm. "...these sorts of horrors add up, believe me. It is _way_ too soon to think that you're over last week's shooting. The stress you're feeling inside, just from those two things alone, may be more than you've been able to consciously face yet."

Marty's nostrils flared and his lips tightened angrily. "Ten years in uniform without firing a shot at a human being. Most cops never do, you know."

"Same way with me, buddy. I'd been in uniform even longer than you before I joined the SRU, and had never shot anyone. And now...I don't even like to think about how many times I've had to go lethal. And it hurts, man, it hurts something awful."

"But I thought the whole point of the SRU was to train and equip cops so thoroughly, with such a wide range of non-lethal options, that we would be even less likely to have to kill. And now I'm learning that we're _more_ likely to kill! What's with that?"

Ed shook his head. "Believe it or not, we're not more likely to kill...in the same settings as regular uni's. But our training and equipment gets us into settings that regular uni's can't get into, and those tend to be far more volatile. Those are the kinds of situations where, if uni's _do_ breach, they end up seeing more _civilian_ casualties. We've seen very few of those."

"That's something, I guess." Marty still stared at his coffee.

"Yeah, it's a very big something." Ed took a sip of his own brew. "I haven't killed in situations where a uniformed officer would have chosen a non-lethal option. I've killed where a uniformed officer would have done the same...except most likely he couldn't have gone in in the first place." Ed set his cup down on a coaster. "And even then, we've used lethal force as rarely as possible, less often than the uni's would, if they could have gotten in. Does that make sense?"

Marty just nodded, but hardly seemed to feel better.

Ed's eyes narrowed as he sized up his colleague. "But between your shooting last week, and the accident today, you're dealing with the kind of pain that can't just be reasoned away with logical facts, like what we're talking about now."

"Well, what am I supposed to do?" LeClerc jumped out of his seat and began to pace. "How do I cope with this? How do I keep it from changing me into...into the sort of monster I almost became tonight?"

"What happened tonight, Marty? Sit down so we can talk more quietly."

The loudness level wasn't really what bothered Ed, though it might possibly be enough to waken Isabel if it went on. Mostly he just wanted Marty seated nearby so he was within easy reach. So he could be more easily controlled if he freaked out.

_Is he armed?_ Ed kicked himself for not having looked at him more carefully while they were walking into the room. From this angle, he couldn't tell for sure.

Marty sat back down, but he seemed even more upset as he did so. "I'm sorry, Ed. Now I've messed things up for your kid, too..." He ran his hands through his hair. His face and body language tagged him as utterly distraught.

Ed put a hand on his shoulder again. "You didn't mess anything up, Marty, it's okay. Just calm down, buddy, calm down. You said you didn't hurt your child, right? So what do you mean that you messed things up?"

"I...I came home after work, and I still felt sick over what I'd seen." He ran a hand through his hair again. "I just kept thinking how I wished we had taken another route back to the station, so we wouldn't have seen that accident happen. Then the uni's would have had to handle it. We're not traffic cops!"

"We have to render aid, Marty."

"Oh I know, I know, I know our responsibilities. I just wish we'd taken another route, that's all."

"Wishing won't do any good, except maybe distracting us from the topic at hand. What happened when you got home?"

"The kids were arguing, screaming at each other over a stupid broken toy. Just a stupid, broken toy! And they were acting like it was the end of the world, screaming and crying and carrying on...!" His voice rose a good bit, but he caught himself and stopped talking altogether.

"Kids think broken toys _are_ the end of the world. You know that."

"That's just it...I _do_ know that! But it didn't make any difference tonight. I wasn't myself tonight at all! I don't even know who I was! This job is changing me, Sarge! And I don't like who it's changing me into."

Ed nodded. "Been there, buddy. Been there."

"So what do I do? Quit my job?"

"Why don't you finish telling me what happened? How did you react to the kids?"

Marty's breath came short again. "I picked up Clarice...she's the two-year-old...and I screamed at her, right in her face!" He was crying now. "I was screaming at the top of my lungs, 'Don't you know it's just a toy? Shut up about it! Don't you know there are broken _people_ in the world? It's just a stupid toy!' Stuff like that. But Sarge, as bad as that was...and it was terrible...that wasn't the worst part. The fact is...the fact is...it was everything I could do not to shake her, not to hit her...I could see myself in my mind's eye, doing those things!" He turned tortured eyes to Ed. 'That's the part that scares me, Sarge! I could see it! I wanted to do it! I wanted to!"

"But you didn't?"

"No, no." For a moment he scrubbed at his face with his hands, but then he held up his hands in front of himself, as if holding a little child at arm's length. "She was sobbing, screaming in fear...fear of _me!_ Of _me!_ My little girl..." His voice choked itself off, and his hands fell limp in his lap.

"But you didn't do it, and that's the most important part, Marty. I'm glad to hear it. But you're right, you have to deal with this, with what's going on inside of you."

"How?"

Ed sat back in his chair, confident for the moment that Marty wouldn't go ballistic...but still ready if he did. _Maybe if I relax more in my seat, he'll do the same._

"Where was Renee when this happened?" Ed asked after a few moments. "You said she didn't know..."

"Oh, she knew about the screaming, for sure! She came running and snatched Clarice away from me and ran with her into the bedroom. That's when I came to my senses and realized what I'd done." He hid his face in his hands for a few moments. "Reggie, my son, was just staring at me, with tears streaming down his face." Marty lifted his head again, but didn't look at Ed. "I staggered into the bedroom and sat down on the floor...you know, so I'd look less threatening, and I apologized over and over again to Clarice and Renee...I was crying...but they wouldn't come near me. And I knew better than to try to approach them."

"So what part didn't Renee know about?"

"My thoughts. What I imagined doing."

"Oh, I see."

Ed tried hard to keep his appearance relaxed even as he heightened his scrutiny of the man in front of him.

_I think he's telling me the whole truth. I think so._

"So what happened next?"

"I...when I saw that they weren't going to come near me, I just...I just left. Got in my car and drove around a while, but then I realized I was seeing that decapitated woman more than I was seeing the road in front of me. That's when I pulled over and called you."

"I'm glad you did," Ed murmured.

Silence fell. Ed used the time to collect his thoughts.

"So what am I supposed to do?" Marty asked again.

"Tell me something, my friend...how have things been between you and your wife lately?"

Marty shrugged. "Not bad, really. We're a police family, so of course we deal with all of those complications. But we've always done okay."

"What about since your use of lethal force?"

"She's been great! Very supportive."

Ed thought some more.

"I don't understand why you're even asking me about her. The problem wasn't with her," Marty added.

"It's just something you said to your daughter. It reminded me of something that I was blind to in myself for many years, and it impacted my marriage as well as my parenting. Would it be okay if I told you about that, just to see if it strikes a chord with you?"

"Yeah, okay." Marty sat back in his seat, instantly more relaxed now that all he had to do was listen.

Ed relaxed a bit more as well. "For years I felt a huge chasm growing between myself and the rest of my family, and it came from the fact that we lived in different worlds. I felt like the world they lived in was a...I don't know...a pitifully naive world. Like they lived in make-believe, or something, and only cops like me knew what the world was _really _like. Their world didn't deserve to be taken seriously. You know what I'm talking about?"

"Sure, every cop feels that way, at least sometimes."

Ed nodded. "I would deal with life-and-death situations, and then come home to hear trivia being treated as if it were life-and-death. I started to feel like...like they were all clueless. Like they were all...I hate to say it...inferior. I felt condescending toward them...like I was doing them a favor by joining them in their trivial little worlds now and then. I didn't put it into words like that, of course. I didn't face the truth of how I was feeling for a long time." He realized that he'd been staring at the floor as he made his shameful confession, so he looked back at Marty now. "Still ringing bells?"

Marty nodded with a dismissive shrug. "Sure. Every rookie faces that problem pretty quickly. My training officer told me about it my first day on the job, back when I was a regular uni. But I've been dealing with the two different worlds for a decade, and it never tempted me to abuse my kids before, so I don't see what it has to do with anything."

"But what did you say when you screamed at your daughter tonight?"

Marty spread his hands and recited his words with obvious frustration at having to do so. "I said, 'How could you get so upset about a stupid broken toy?'"

"In other words, 'How can you be so naive? Why can't you live in _my_ world, the only _real_ world?'"

"Yeah, I guess so." Marty shrugged. "But there's nothing we can do about our clueless families. We just have to learn to deal with the fact that we can't ever live in the same worlds, and figure out how to love them despite all of that. But I've been doing it just fine for ten years, like I said. I think you're barking up the wrong tree."

"You've never before had to recover from using lethal force or seeing a decapitation, but now you've had to do both in just a week's time. And where did it all fall apart for you? At the sight of your child living in her own world instead of in yours. She seemed unbearably stupid in that moment, didn't she? You couldn't stand her because of it, right?"

"Well, it sounds like you're telling me there's no hope, because if I can't trust myself to love them in their world any more, and they can't ever live in my world, then what have we got?"

Ed leaned forward again. "You've got room for a new perspective."

"I'm all ears."

Ed sat back and sighed, giving himself time to collect his thoughts. "One day...I guess it was about 8 months after Izzie was born, I was involved in a terrible, drawn out, life-and-death ordeal at work, and we managed to get everybody out alive despite hopeless odds. And I came home an hour late after all of that, and Sophie was mad at me for it! I'd helped to save half a dozen lives, and I was in trouble for being an hour late! True, it was her birthday, but come on! Was I supposed to let those people die?"

"I hear you, believe me."

"I was seeing red, man. I stormed into my room, fuming over how awful it was to have to put up with my family not understanding my world, when all of a sudden I hit a brick wall, so to speak. Stopped me in my tracks. I could almost see it written on that wall..."Do you really wish they knew your world? Would you really want them to have your stress, your flashbacks, your nightmares?"

Marty's head jerked back just a little, as if the question had hit home.

"Why do we put this uniform on every day, Marty? Isn't it so that our families, and other people's families, can be safe from living in the nightmare? Isn't that what we want for them?"

Marty nodded slowly, staring into the space ahead of him.

"We tackle the nightmare so we can give them the gift of living in a real world without nightmares...or at least without as many as we can protect them from. We put blood, sweat, and tears into keeping them safe, and then we get mad at them for living in and loving the safe world we've given them!"

Ed eyed Marty narrowly. The rookie seemed attentive, but also far away.

"And if some madman figured out a way to bottle our reality, and force it on our kids and on our wives, we'd fight to the death to protect them from it, wouldn't we?"

Marty nodded, still not looking at Ed.

"Their world isn't Fairyland, and our world isn't Reality with a capital R. Both worlds are very, very real facets of life. And after that day, whenever my wife has gotten mad at me for being late, or has otherwise shown that she's clueless about my life, or when my daughter shows that she's really a three-year-old, and not a veteran of the force, if I start to feel irritated or superior, I can stop myself and say, 'I'm glad they don't understand the pain of my world. That's my gift to them, whether they ever know it or not. I'm so glad that I can protect them from that.' And I feel my anger melting away, and I find myself treasuring my daughter's innocence again. I find myself enjoying the fact that my wife has the luxury of being upset over things that seem trivial to me. And once I adjust my attitude that far, I can often go even further and realize that their concerns really are valid, their problems really do matter. They deserve that from me, Marty. Your family deserves it from you. But for me, anyway, it's impossible to get there until I've reminded myself that I want their lives to be sheltered."

"Yeah, I get what you're saying. I hadn't thought about it that way before."

"And after I get my head on straight, I can put my arms around them and apologize, and then I do my best to make sure that we can all enjoy the rest of the time we have together in the ordinary world that day. And it's made a tremendous difference for us all, Marty, just that one little change of perspective."

"But it just torques me to have to apologize when I haven't done anything wrong!" Marty interjected. "Why should I apologize for doing the most honorable, self-sacrificing kind of work imaginable, and saving lives? Why should I?" He was growing loud again, but caught himself with another guilty glance at the door.

"I don't ever apologize for that. I say that I'm sorry, because I am. Not the kind of 'sorry' that means 'I was wrong,' but the kind of 'sorry' that means 'I wish it had worked out differently for you.' No blame, just wishing for her sake that it could have worked out differently. Like I would say 'I'm sorry' if she dropped a knickknack that she cared about. It just means that I'm sad for her. And I can be, when I remember all the stuff we talked about."

Marty nodded again.

"After all," Ed concluded, "as I keep having to remind myself, it's not really 'my world' versus 'their worlds.' It's the 'crisis world' versus the 'ordinary world,' and those are _both_ my worlds, Marty. I'm lucky to have both, and I just need to remember that."

Marty seemed to have found a world that was entirely his own for the moment, and Ed let him have his space.

A couple of minutes later, Marty seemed to shake himself. "The transitions are just so hard, though. You know how it is...the moment you walk in the front door...if you meet with chaos, you know you're going to be in trouble. And they're so wrapped up in their problems that they don't want to hear about yours. But on the other hand, if things are peaceful and happy, well, the last thing that Renee wants me to do is bring my problems in to spoil the good mood. So how do you make your worlds meet...I mean, in a good way?"

Ed thought some more, and then shrugged slightly. "I can't tell you exactly what will work best in your family. I can tell you what Sophie and I have worked out. We've come to realize that we need...like...buffer zones. Yeah, that's a good way to look at it. Buffer zones. Like tonight, after she got Izzie down for the night, she came out and sat with me on the porch, and I could see that she was checking me out, and realizing that I'd had a really bad day. Realizing that I was upset. But she also knew from experience that I didn't want to talk about it just then. And those are the key words. _Just then._"

Ed paused for another swallow of coffee. "The biggest mistake of my marriage for many years was not talking about it _at all._ That ate me alive, and it threatened our marriage because she hated feeling shut out. So after we went through a real marital crisis...we separated for a while...we sat down and hashed out what we both needed to do to make things work. And we hit on this idea of safe times...buffer zones...times when we could be together and just enjoy each other, but with the promise that the hard talking would happen later, for sure. We just would choose a more neutral time for it...not spoiling what could be a special time together, not dumping stuff onto an already stressful time, not bottling it up, but making a deliberate decision that we would make the time to sit down and talk as soon as we could do it right. It helped a lot. You and Renee will have to figure out your own way of deliberately bringing those worlds together. But in the other times, when you just have to meet your home life as it comes, just remember to be glad about their protectedness, okay?" He gave the rookie a friendly thump on the shoulder. "Make sense?"

"Yeah, it does." Marty fell silent again for a while before going on. "So...um...how do you recommend I make things right at home? I mean, I get what you're saying about how to handle the next time, and it sounds good. I think it will really help. But how do I go home to them tonight? What if Clarice is still afraid of me? What if Renee can't forgive me?"

"Go home _calm_, tell your wife you're sorry and that you've been doing some soul-searching, and that you think you know what went wrong, and how to never let it happen again. Sit down and talk it out with her. I don't know your wife, but I know that my wife really wants to be in on my life, my heart, my head, everything that's going on inside of me. She wants to be respected enough to be entrusted with the hard realities of my life and how I'm learning to deal with them. She doesn't want to be shut out or condescended to."

"Yeah, Renee's the same way."

"I'm not going to pretend that it's going to be easy. But I think that's the right plan." Ed allowed himself a sigh of satisfaction. _I think we're about done here._

Marty nodded.

"How would you describe your marriage and your communication over all?" Ed probed.

"Pretty good, really."

"Then you've got a good foundation already. Just build on that."

Marty sighed deeply, nodded, and stood up. He extended a hand to Ed, and Ed shook it warmly.

"Thanks, Sarge. I can't tell you how much you helped."

"You're welcome, and I'm glad. Now go home and love on your family, okay?"

"Yeah." Marty checked his watch. "But even Reggie will be in bed by now."

"That's okay. Renee tonight, the kids tomorrow."

"Yeah." Marty thumped Ed on the shoulder, and Ed returned the favor. They walked quietly out to the front door, and Ed watched until Marty had driven out of sight.


	3. Chapter 3 - Revelation

**Chapter 3**

**Revelation**

Ed turned off the lights and let himself into his bedroom, keeping quiet in case Sophie had fallen asleep.

But no, she was sitting on her padded bentwood rocker; the one where she used to nurse Izzie, and where she had nursed Clark years before. She rocked quietly, and looked up at him with an expression he could not read.

"Hey, baby, I think we managed to avoid waking Isabel, am I right?"

Sophie nodded. "Yeah. Your voices were carrying into her room, but not too loudly. She slept through it."

"How often did you go in to check on her? I didn't hear you at all."

"I didn't go in."

"Then how do you know our voices went in there?" He started undressing as he asked.

"How do you think?" She nodded over toward her nightstand.

Ed glanced over and froze. "The baby monitor."

"Mm-hm."

"You heard every word we said."

"No, but most of it. I certainly got the gist."

He stared at the monitor for a few more seconds before he remembered that he was changing into his pajamas. He proceeded automatically, his mind urgently replaying his words of the evening, wondering if he'd said anything he wished she hadn't heard. By the time he got his pajamas completely on, he'd resigned himself to uncertainty.

"Did I say anything that we need to talk about?"

"Yes, you did, but it's up to you if you'd rather have that talk now, or later."

He stopped and scrutinized her expression as best he could. "I guess that depends on whether you're mad about anything."

She smiled, got up, and walked across the room, into his arms. "No, I'm not angry about anything."

"Then let's talk about it tomorrow."

###

Izzie held out yet another toy for her father to 'play' with. He didn't really know what to do with it, but he bopped it around a bit and tried not to mind doing so.

_It's not what you're doing, it who you're doing it with._ Words from last night's conversation kept running through his head, reminding him to enjoy these moments. So he studied his daughter, appreciated her, humored her, took her to the potty...

...and was ready for a break. "Okay, sweetie, you play with your toys. Daddy has some things to do now." Then he stuck his head in the kitchen to tell Sophie that he was going to chill in the den for a while.

_Okay, I'm not the best at playing with three-year-old girls. But at least she knows I love her._

He settled into his favorite den chair with a feeling of relief, and picked up the newspaper. Then he thought better of it, took out his phone, and fired off a text to Marty. "How's it going, buddy?"

He'd finished about half of an article on the sports page when he got his reply. "It's good, thanks."

"Glad to hear it," he replied, and left it at that.

He'd finished scanning the sports and was about to move on to the local news section when he heard Sophie putting Isabel down for her nap.

He set the paper down. _Time for that talk._

And then he winced. _I don't want to see the article about that accident, anyway._ He shuddered.

Sophie walked in just a few moments later, and helped herself to a cup of hot chocolate from the single-cup brewer. When she sat down with her drink, she gave him a look that seemed half playful, half irritated. "Is this a good time for you to join me in my trivial, clueless, fairyland world?"

Ed looked down, and he could feel his lips pursing in that amused, "you caught me" expression that he naturally assumed at such moments. "Hey," he replied as he looked back up at her, "I said that was how I _used to_ feel. And as soon as I realized it, I straightened it out." Now it was his turn to throw an annoyed-playful look at her. "I thought you said you weren't mad..."

"I wasn't, last night. But for some reason today it started to play back in my head, and I wanted to smack you one." She blew on her cocoa, but never took her eyes off of him. "I still might..."

He smiled widely now, then spread his hands wide in an SRU-worthy gesture of placation. "I'm at your mercy."

She threw a pillow at him, and he laughed as he deflected it. But then his laughter faded when he saw her expression change.

He stood and walked closer, squatting down beside her chair and taking her hand in his. "Honey, you're really upset, aren't you?"

She looked away. "I don't understand why, but yes, I am getting more upset."

"Then we need to talk about it."

"Yeah." She let her gaze meet his again, and she smiled a little.

_She doesn't want to be upset. _

_That's good news._

"How can I help?" he asked.

"I just...I keep thinking back to those years...I mean...I knew you felt superior. I would have to have been blind not to see it. But I still felt like you loved me."

Ed's jaw dropped, and his eyes widened hugely. "I _did!_ Baby, I did!" He stood and pulled her up into his arms. "Please don't ever, ever think there was a day in my life when I didn't love you. Please!"

She returned the hug, but only half-heartedly, and she sat back down quickly. "Eddie, how can love and disrespect...even _contempt_...coexist toward the same person?"

Ed felt something close to panic rising up in his chest. He sat down and took her hand again, mind racing. "I...don't know. I mean, I can't explain it, but I know it's true! The love was totally conscious, baby. The other was subconscious. I rejected it as soon as it came to my attention, as soon as I really thought about it. That's got to tell you something!"

Ed cast around in his mind for something from his training that could help him out, could help him frame the truth in such a way that she'd hear it.

_Find common ground..._

He gave her hand a gentle squeeze. "After all, didn't you ever feel frustrated and irritated with me when I didn't 'get' your world? Didn't you think I was clueless?"

She snorted and rolled her eyes. "You _were!_ Totally!" And then she looked at him out of the corner of her eye, slyly, as if wondering if he'd noticed that she'd just stuck her foot in her mouth.

He grinned, more widely with each moment as she unsuccessfully fought a smile of her own.

Finally she shook her head, fixing him with a look of loving exasperation. "Have I ever told you lucky you are that I love you?"

"All the time!" He straightened up just far enough to plant a kiss on her forehead, and then squatted back down again. "And you're right."

She put a hand on his cheek and looked quietly into his eyes. "I guess I can't put you in the doghouse without crawling in there with you."

"That could be fun."

"Scamp."

They both jumped, startled, as a voice hollered, "Hey, anybody home?"

Ed and Sophie both dove for the door. Ed yanked it open, and they both said "Shhhh!" as loudly as they could.

"Sorry." Their son Clark cringed a bit and glanced at Izzie's door, but no protests emerged from behind it.

Sophie looked at her watch. "It's a little late for lunch, but I can make you something if you haven't eaten," she whispered as she escorted Clark out toward the common areas of the house.

Ed followed behind, smiling contentedly at having his son home. _It's got to be over a week since I've seen him!_

"I was hoping you'd say that," Clark replied, with a wink back at his dad. "Starving college kid and all..."

Ed grinned and returned the wink, then reached forward to tousle Clark's hair. "You just know that nobody cooks like your mom does!"

"That too," he nodded.

"All right, you two, you don't have to bribe me with flattery. I'll cook, I'll cook." She hugged her son and kissed his cheek. "Not that I don't like the flattery!"

She set to work making Clark's favorite sandwich without even asking what he wanted. She knew.

Both men sat down at the table. Clark stared at his mother as if it would make the food cook faster.

"Hey," Ed got his son's attention with a thump on the shoulder. "Still doing your rehab?"

Clark shrugged. "Sometimes. Not much. I'm pretty much better now, Dad." His face took on a mischievous set that told Ed he was about to get zinged. "Broken bones heal, Dad, at least for people who are young, like me." He patted his father's arm a few times to drive his point home.

Ed pointed a finger at his face, with a "you'd better watch it, because I'm trying to be mad" expression.

Sophie looked over at the two of them and smiled. "How's school going, baby?"

Clark sat down beside Ed and started relating his life's details. Some obviously loomed huge in his eyes, and others seemed less so.

Ed just sat back and watched the drama of Ordinary World.

_Sophie and I still haven't talked about the trauma of seeing that accident. We'll need to do that, but not now._

_Now it's time for Ordinary World._

_I'm so lucky to live in this world, too._


End file.
